Welcome all to my build! I have had good feedback in game from this build so thought I may as well make this build for anyone wanting to change their Pally or for someone who wants to pick up a Pally for the first time. I have split the build into the different catagories, so if you need only a certain part, it is more easily accessable. However, the whole build can still be viewed in its own tab. I hope you enjoy!

NOTE: I took a break from the game between November and January and have come back and begun maining my DC. So this build will not be getting changed unless I decide to start using my OP again, so I am going to make this a more “Mid-Game” build. I will try to answer questions based off of Chult stuff and Omu stuff if I know enough, however.

Races:

Whilst there are many different races as an option for a Pally tank, I chose the human race, for the extra 3 Heroic Feat Points as well as the +2 to ANY ability score. More Constitution is our friend. The extra 3% Defence is also nice. However, there are also other possible races, which I will briefly go into:

Tiefling – My initial race. You get a bonus 5% damage when your target is under half HP (Basically a free Fire Archon) which helps you hold aggro and keep your HP up in boss battles. Also as a Tiefling, when you take damage, you have a 10% chance to drop the targets power by 5% for 5 seconds. A nice little debuff just for doing your job. You also get +2 to Charisma for more AP Gain and CA Damage. You also get a choice of +2 to Constitution or Intelligence. For this, choose Constitution since that’s a Pallies main stat.

Dragonborn – I find this race has a valid place for every class. +2 to any 2 stats of your choice isn’t something you can just pass up. Power and Crit being increased by 3% is a good self buff, it also increases the amount of power you share with your allies. The 5% more healing and abilities comes in handy, more heals from your healers in dungeons, your Life Steal and Sanctuary.

Metallic Ancestry Dragonborn – The most expensive class in the game, only obtainable from the Sigil of the Metallic Ancestry Dragonborn from either the Auction House or from Dragonforged Lockbox or Glorious Resurgence Lockbox. This is what I will be switching to when I get it. You get +2 to any 2 stats (The same as Dragonborn) and the same +3% bonus to Power and Crit as the Dragonborn. Where this race outshines any other is its third Trait. You recieve 3% more healing from all spells and abilities (a decrease from the 5% from Dragonborn but still useful) and your HP is increased by 3%. This increases the amount of power you can have and therefore share as well as improves survivability.

Stat Rolls:

I rolled my Stats with my Constitution as max (18) and my Charisma and Wisdom equal at 13 . I invested in Constitution and Wisdom at any point I could to focus on getting my crit up, since I don’t care all that much about my recovery. This along with the +1s to all at levels 30 and 60 give a final Constitution of 25 (27 after the human +2) and Wisdom of 20.

My final Stat Rolls:

As you see, I have 32 Constitution, this I will come back to when we talk about gear.

Feats:
Now is the bit which is rarely changed from one Pally to another, the Feats.

Heroic:

Divine Action – 3/5 – Any way to get more AP will help your team and yourself.

Weapon Mastery – 3/3 – Working to maximise crit and damage output. This will help.

Toughness – 3/3 – For a Pally tank, HP is everything. Can’t say no to an extra 9%.

Light’s Shield – 0/5 – Trying to minimise Damage Resistance to get our Oath up quicker, plus its easy to make up Damage Resistance in combat.

Exemplar’s Haste – 3/3 – Encounter Powers recharging 6% faster? Yes please. More uptime on your Encounters, the more you can keep yourself alive and the faster you can get your AP up.

Wrathful Strikes – 3/3 – 6% more damage with At-Wills. Since your At-Wills will be your main way of dealing damage, this will help. It also helps you hold aggro since more damage = more aggro.

Dominating Presence – 0/5 – My auras radius’ are more than fine at their default size so an increase isn’t really needed.

Impassioned Pleas – 0/3 – Divine Call energy isn’t hard to come by and I rarely have a time when I don’t have at least one charge on it so an increase in the energy is a waste.

Divine Attunement – 0/3 – receiving more healing from spells, if needed, can easily be sorted by your race selection.

Steadfast – 5/5 – Getting an extra 2.5% Max HP for each point of Constitution you have is not something you can say no to. It will help a lot.

Divine Wisdom – 0/3 – More healing for each point of Wisdom, again if more healing is needed, can be easily sorted by races.

Force of Will – 0/3 – 3/3 if Human – More Crit Chance for each point of Charisma. An additional 6%, outweighs that gained from Weapon Mastery

Justice:

The main path of a Protection Pally. This is the path to reduce yours and your allies cooldowns.

Swift Flash – 0/5 – When you get struck you gain movement speed for 4 seconds, not really needed since if you are tanking you are going to be sat in one place most of the time.

Bound By Light – 5/5 – Control Strength is increased by 10%. Helps for smaller mobs with Templars Wrath’s stun.

Flash of Light – 5/5 – You will use your encounters a lot, so having a 25% chance of reducing an allies cooldown by 10% just for us using one is a chance worth taking. Mixing this with another Feat will make this proc a lot.

Radiant Champion – 5/5 – One of my favourite feats. Having 2 allies near me gives us 25% more movement speed and 5% cooldown reduction. Reducing your allies cooldowns just by them being near you and making them move faster can help them get out any danger if their stamina is low.

Stem The Tide – 0/5 – “When no allies are within 30′ of you” This is probably one of the worst feats we have. Allies includes companion so if you aren’t near your companion or your team, where are you?

Echoes of Light – 5/5 – a 10% chance to make your next encounter immediately recharge all of your encounters is amazing. It can only happen once every 15 seconds but that’s more than enough. Mixing this with Flash of Light also helps your team out a lot.

Beacon of Hope – 2/5 – Dailies come often for us so the extra heals for your team will also. Not much since we’re only going for 100% of our weapon damage, but that can make up for around 2000 HP every 2 seconds which can help a bit.

Purifying Fire – 0/5 – The extra damage would be nice, however since we use a lot of encounters, we will often stop this feats effect, making it pretty much pointless.

Prism – 3/5 – As with Beacon of Hope, dailies come often, so the extra healing for our team helps. 12 seconds of healing allies what you are healed will help and have a pretty strong uptime.

Vengeful Judge – 1/1 – The Justice topper. Using your Divine Call increases your damage by 35% for 10 seconds (more threat) as well as reducing all your cooldowns by 35%. This makes your Divine Call act as a large amount of recovery, allowing you to put the recovery investments elsewhere.

Light:

Quick mention about Bulwark. I didn’t invest in it at all, I see more potential from Light and Justice over it. Anyway, this is Lights section, so this is where we put our last 15 Paragon Points. You only come here for the Aura Gifts.

Gifts of Light – 5/5 – You heal for 10% more. Well, it’s either this or your heals do more for 8 seconds after taking damage. This is the lesser of the two evils.

Seraphim – 0/5 – Not for a Protection at all. Plus its limited to 8 seconds wheras Gifts of Light is constant. Enough said.

Light Touched – 0/5 – Healing Spells generate more AP. We don’t use any healing spells so investing in this would be a waste of points.

Warrior’s Bastion – 5/5 – The main source of defense for us. Getting 10% more from equipment helps us survive some of the bigger hits.

Aura Gifts – 5/5 – The biggest buff any Pally can give.sharing 25% of your base power (Your standing + the 10% of your max HP bonus from the Protection Mechanic). Yes they have to stay within 30′ of you for 6 seconds to receive this buff but that will happen easily in dungeons.

Powers:

The biggest bit! I will be splitting this into At-Wills, Encounters, Dailies and Auras. Each will include the ones I most commonly use and why.

At-Wills:

Radiant Strike – Easy access into combat and a 5% Damage and Arm Pen buff for 15 seconds. Also hits multiple enemies to get some damage off on them.

Valorous Strike – A 5% Damage Resistance buff for 15 seconds is nice but not needed.

Shielding Strike – Does a lot of damage. It provides a shield on the final hit of its combo, which is good. However I prefer the buffs from Valorous, so this one is personal bias. Works well for damage. I find it hits slightly slower than Valorous Strike but seems to do better damage, this will be slotted alongside Radiant Strike.

Oath Strike – The final hit of this attack forces the enemy to attack you for 3 seconds which helps a lot with maintaining your aggro. Can be a good alternative in melt groups for gaining threat easier, or just if you dont feel like you need the Damage Resistance buff.

Encounter:

Binding Oath – In dungeons, this is only ever used for heavy trash in end-game dungeons (FBI/MSVA/MSP) 5 seconds of enemies being forced to attack you, as well as giving you 100% of your max HP as a shield (Which can be a lot). Oh, did I forget to mention that when the 5 seconds is up or your shield has been drained by enemies it bounces back 100% of how much you took back at the enemies in a 30′ area? Yes you also take 50% of that damage but I’d say that’s worth it. So, the more max HP you have, the more damage you have potential to do. At max this shield lasts for 8 seconds instead of 5 seconds. This is why I say not to use much defense, the more defense you use, the more damage you mitigate, so the less this is going to go down and the less damage will be done with it.

Templars Wrath – Another one that never leaves my tray in dungeons. You hit enemies in a 30′ radius for damage, seem basic right? Well that is until you realise you gain 300% of the damage that you dealt as temp HP. Hitting hard with this can give you a lot of HP, especially if buffed right. You can combine this with Binding Oath to make the damage come from this shield and leaving your base HP untouched. Note: There was a thread about what does and doesn’t affect the Temp HP gotten from TW, link here.

Circle of Power – 30′ wide area to improve your damage by 30% as well as you and your allies damage resistance by 25% which lasts 10 seconds at base and 16 seconds at max isn’t really bad. However I stopped using this recently unless we are in a large group of trash mobs and I’m sat with the squishier members of the group (An example being the first wave of Svardborg or FBI Hill Climb)

Bane – The thing that I swapped Circle out for in my normal tray. A debuff of 10% damage and a buff for allies of 10% more damage. This is an all round solid buff. Especially when you realise it has 3 charges and can be stacked 3 times, meaning 30% more damage for your allies and 30% less damage for you and your allies for 10 seconds.

Vow of Enmity – This increases your own damage by 20% and any hit that an ally does to the marked target will result in more threat for you in case of any issue where you may struggle to get/hold aggro (AH So Cute from Adorable Pocket Pet for example).

Sacred Weapon – I use this in lower dungeons (Any T1s and T2s) alongside smite for some big hits. Use if you know you can survive without one of the others (probably Binding Oath since it has a similar effect minus the Temp HP) for the fact your next 3 attacks force the enemy to attack you as well as the additional damage. Quicker bosses and even easier threat.

Dailies:

Divine Judgement – A solid damage dealing daily with slight AoE damage. Always good to have at least one damaging daily. Very rarely leaves Tray.

Shield of Faith – Reduces damage taken by allies by 30% and lets them get 30% more healing for 6 seconds (12 seconds at max). Never leaves Tray unless soloing dungeons/PvP. Some people may argue that Divine Protector is better, yes, you redirect 60% of damage they would take to you and you take 60% less, however at max it lasts half as long and so you can have more of an uptime on Shield than Divine Protector.

Divine Protector – That being said, this can also be used if you are carrying through new 70s, in bosses that act randomly (Epic Cragmire Crypts) or you need to take damage for the Protection mechanic to proc. I would still prefer Shield over it.

Lay on Hands – An underrated power. This can be a lifesaver. Instant heals to max and removes all DoTs from them. Not to mention it only uses AP proportional to the HP that was healed, meaning this can be used often. Useful for if you want to solo dungeons or you are missing a healer and you are doing a dungeon with a lot of AoEs and the DPS lack the Life Steal to heal themselves.

Auras:

Aura of Courage – Extra damage for your allies, higher DPS, quicker runs. I have seen this hit for some good numbers. Never leaves my tray. Off-hand artifact power also gives 25% Control Resistance to you and your allies, more buffs.

Aura of Wisdom – Increased cooldowns, 10% at base and 25% at max. Lets you get your tanky powers and utility powers back in time. Also helps your team a lot more, reducing your dps encounters, your DCs encounters all increase the dps. Also the off-hand artifact power gives 1% total AP every 3 seconds to you and allies.

Aura of Protection – More Damage Resistance for you and your allies. 5% at base, 12.5% at max. Can be helpful, especially at lower item levels and levels. I find that it loses its use after a while, but can still help when running with another pally who is using one of the above.

Boons:

Most of the boons are pretty easy to tell what you need. I always go for either HP, Power, Crit, anything that heals you when being hit, Resistances to Control/AoE etc. Below I will only say which I chose out of the pair/quad and why.

Sharandar:

Dark Fey Hunter – More power = more power share. Plus Pallys don’t really care for defense all that much.

Fey Precision – More chance to crit is always wanted for damage. Also deflect reduces the effectiveness of Binding Oaths damage.

Feywilds Fortitude – An extra 1600 HP. HP = Tanky. HP = Power = More Power Share. We don’t really need the 3% extra AP Gain since we can make up for that elsewhere.

Elven Tranquility – We will be getting hit a lot, if your base HP gets taken down, this can heal that up. I’d rather be able to heal my own damage and stay alive than dealing more damage.

Elvish Fury – Well, Stamina Regen is good, if you were to use your stamina, I don’t use mine all that much so find that kinda pointless. We don’t Deflect all that much so Fey Thistle isn’t that great for us. There comes a point where you don’t use potions so the bonus 10% from them means nothing. So the extra power for killing is nice for getting your Templars to deal more.

Dread Ring:

Reliquary Keeper’s Strength – Ignore the movement, since its nothing major. The extra 250 power isn’t all that much either but it’s still extra power share for your team.

Evoker’s Thirst – Regeneration only occurs outside of combat so, other than the slight increase to incoming healing, there’s no point. Life Steal helps you heal yourself a tiny bit and also goes towards Assassins Covenant.

Forbidden Piercing – Since we want our Binding Oath to deal as much as we can get it to, we want to avoid deflecting. The Resistance Ignored will also help in general with damage.

Enraged Regrowth – More healing when being hit. It also comes with an extra 4000 Defense, which I don’t like, but I’d rather have the heals over the extra damage.

Augmented Thayan Basion – A shield for 10,000 damage can be a big helps in sticky situations, also it works similar to Binding Oath where it will redirect damage to a nearby enemy. Rampaging Madness takes too long to get the affect since you need 50 stacks and can only get 1 stack a second, so you need to be fighting for at least 50 seconds just to get its effect for 10 seconds. Endless Consumption seems good at first, but we aren’t going to be Life Stealing often or much so it’d be wasted. Burning Guidance is another wasted one since we don’t use healing spells.

Icewind Dale:

Note: I havent completed these boons yet, I only have the first 3 but I will put what I will be choosing for the last 2.

Weathering The Storm – AoE Resist is always nice, the CA damage could also work here but it’s not an important stat to us.

Appreciation of Warmth – Incoming Healing Bonus can help the healers keep us alive if we get that low. Again Stamina Gain would be nice, if we used our stamina much.

Sleet Skills – Extra Crit Severity helps our powers deal more damage. Recovery is not a big thing in my build as you will see when we get to stats.

Cold Shoulder – Damage Reduction is a nice thing to have, helps you and allies survive some bigger hits. Cool Resolve wont do all that much since we wont be missing Stamina.

Avalanche – This last set of boons are honestly bad. Since we will be getting damaged often, we can easily get 20 stacks giving a free 15,000 damage.

Underdark:

Note: Missing the last boon here but again, will put what I will choose.

Primordial Might – Extra power and HP. Gives more Power and a little more Tankiness. All this power shares with allies. Again the defense will reduce the effectiveness of our Binding Oath.

Primordial Focus – Extra Crit and HP. Extra damage and sharable power. The Life Steal can be passed on as it can be made up elsewhere.

Drow Ambush Tactics – Extra Combat Advantage Damage can help at time and I see it more useful than Regeneration.

Drawven Footing – Control Effects have a shorter time when applied to us, makes tanking a lot easier. The stamina gain bonus again isn’t helpful since we rarely use stamina.

Abyssal Strikes – Extra Damage is always nice. The chance for Demon Slayer isn’t that great so I find it useless, the only demons we really face are in Demogorgon and you wont be hurt all that much during it so the damage decrease isn’t worth it. The extra 25% Control Bonus is a nice amount but you wont really need it.

Tyranny of Dragons:

Note: Not progressed nearly at all on this campaign as I only have the first 2 boons, again, will list my choice for the others.

Dragonheart – Extra HP is always wanted, need I say more?

Dragon’s Gaze – Crit Strike is good for more damage. Deflect decreases effectiveness of Binding Oath so I avoid.

Draconic Armorbreaker – Extra Armour Pen is going to be helpfull and is more useful to us than Defense would be.

Dragon’s Thirst – 3/3 – Extra Life Steal for Assassins Covenant. Incoming Healing isn’t really needed for us. The Crit Sev would be nice, however I feel the extra power from Assassins Covenant would be better overall. The increased Control Strength isn’t really needed all too much since we can hold aggro more than easily.

Guild Boons:

I am in a guild hall 20 so we have most of our boons maxed. I will put the level next to the boon to make sure.

Power – Level 10 – Extra 8000 Power to power share and use myself. The Armour Pen is good to use until you get yourself to 60% Armour Pen without it using Bondings.

Hit Points – Level 10 – Extra 36000 max HP. Gives us more HP to Power conversion for our Mechanic to then Power Share. Also more tanking capabilities.

Maze Engine

Abyssal Regeneration – Extra healing from DCs/Healadins etc as well as extra from my self heals like Life Steal. More diverse than the Life Steal Severity boon to me.

Demonic Resilence – Reduce the times that Control effects have on you to make your job as a tank a little easier.

Demonic Swiftness – Gaining AP quicker is always a good thing, plus we don’t use stamina so regenerating it quicker does nothing for us.

Baphomet’s Might – Displace Fate isn’t really worth it because of how situational it is, Engine Inspiration is useless since we don’t use healing spells. Baleful Clutch could be good but I don’t have issues with holding aggro. The extra Crit gained from Baphomet’s Might helps out quite a bit in combat.

Elemental Evil

Wave of Force – HP and Power for the same reasons as above

Heart of Stone – Life Steal Severity is more useful in combat than Regeneration is

Searing Aggression – More crit, more damage. Recovery isnt needed all that much with this build so its easily skippable.

Gale of Retribution – Heals after being hit topped off with a nice buff to Crit. Better for me than Wall of Wind since I don’t care for recovery, Bolstering Storm gives unneeded stamina gain and Furious Whirlwind gives extra Lifesteal Severity which although good, isn’t quite needed as much.

Storm Kings Thunder

Frosty Demeanor – More Control Resist is good. If Cold Hearted gave more Life Steal instead of Life Steal Severity I would have chosen that for the buff from Assassins Covenant.

Survival Instincts – Like said before, we don’t use Stamina, so Stamina Regen isn’t useful for us. The extra incoming heals is, however.

Icy Wrath – Stamina Missing? Well, we don’t. A chance to gain an extra 2000 damage on your next hit is nice since we will always be getting hit.

Glacial Strength – HP is our main focus, never say no to it.

Chill of Winter – A little extra damage is always nice. The other ones just aren’t for our class. We don’t heal, we don’t use potions and we don’t deflect all that much.

Healing Warmth – Due to the amount of heals that we will be doing now we are using Prism and Beacon, I am testing to see how this does with damage compared to Chill of Winter since it has more of a chance to proc.

The Cloaked Ascendancy

Aura of Hope – The extra AP gain is better than just stunning, gets yours and your allies dailies back quicker.

Abberant Power – Getting hit lets you deal more damage, so just keep up tanking.

Jungles of Chult

Tyrant’s Terror – You gain 500/750/1000 Power and 800/1200/1600 Maximum Hit Points. – 3/3 – This boon is the only one to go for if you are wanting to maximise your power share, like I do. After mechanic, it gives us 116 power (not including increase to HP from feats)

Soul Syphon – Chance on Hit to gain a stack of Soul Syphon. On killing a creature, you release all stacks of Soul Syphon in a burst at all nearby enemies. Each enemy recieves 2000 damage per second lasting 1 second per stack of Soul Syphon. You restore 1% of your max health for every stack released. Stacks up to 10 times. – Okay, so a basic hit an enemy, get a stack. Kill an enemy, lose all stacks for effect boon. This is nice to use since it can cause 20000 damage to enemies over 10 seconds and give you 10% of your HP back. That’s if you can get all 10 stacks however.

Gear:

Head – Jarls Gaze – 5,877 HP is, admittedly, not a large amount of HP. However, its worth it for the extra power to improve your power share. It also gives you even more power if in an Everfrost Zone dependant on how high your Everfrost Resistance is. I am aiming for the Guise of the Wolfclan however since it is better overall. A good alternative until you can get one of these is Dragons Loyalists Visage due to the HP that it gives alongside a nice amount of power.

Chest – Deepknights Brigadine – 50495 HP. Easily the best Chest for a Pally. Reinforced with Major Hit Points Armor Kit for the Extra 800 HP.

Arms – Pilgrim Restoration Tahadus – HP/Power/Rec/Def – Cant go wrong with these, good piece of gear and fairly easily accessable from the Trade Bar Merchant. Will be upgrading to Primal Restoration Ibhendis when I get to ToNG just for the overall increase in stats over these.

Boots – Vivified Oathkeepers Restoration Poleyns – Everfrost Resist/HP/Power/Crit/Def – Gives a good amount of power and HP. Thats all the reasoning I have for these. Will be swapping these out for Primal Restoration Isikhumbas when I start running ToNG as they give more power.

NOTE: I will be changing the HP reinforcement kits to Power reinforcement kits over time for the extra power share.

Neck – Cloak of the Protector. Not the best of cloaks, but would rather use this over switching out another artifact for the Greater Protector set. Reinforced with Major AP Gain Jewel for +100 AP Gain.

1 Ring of the Hunter +4 Power/Crit/Movement – Good solid ring for more power, also Off/Def enchant slots.

Waist – Greater Plated Belt of Constitution – +4 to your Constitution at max. Since Constitution is the main stat we want to focus in, this is essential. Also a part of the Greater Protector set. Reinforced with Major AP Gain Jewel for +100 AP Gain.

Pants – Drowcraft Chausses – HP, Recovery, Defense. Gives the set bonus for the Drowcraft (Heals allies when you crit for a little bit) plus have some good supporting stats. Reinforced with Greater Everfrost Resist Armor Kit for 5% Everfrost Resistance.

Weapons – Relic Set. We want to maximise our damage too to get and hold that aggro. This set also gives us a slight defense boost instead of an offensive one if you ever have one of those urgent situations. Main Hand Artifact equip power to boost Radiant Strike, more damage on entry to combat, no complaints. Off-Hand Artifact equip power to give Control Resist with my Aura of Courage, good team buff.

Enchants – You want to maximise your HP and your Power, so put Radiants in your Offense and Defense slots, whilst putting Darks in your Utilities for the extra movement speed to get you in combat faster.

Armor Enchantment – I current run a Lesser Soulforged so if I do mess up something I can get back and get aggro back without issue. Currently in process of swapping to an Elven Battle Enchantment so I can reduce controls and stuns on me, making tanking more seemless.

Weapon Enchantment – Currently run a Greater Terror for the debuff. You can instead use a Feytouched as its Siphoned power increases the Temp HP gotten from Templars Wrath.

You will want to run a Debuffer as your main one to help the team out. I currently run with a Sellsword as my summoned, a Rebel Mercenary will also work since it is basically a reskinned version of the Sellsword. I run an offensively built companion, stacking its Armor Pen and Crit mainly to get myself up the respective caps. I use Bold Neck of the Companion +3, Bold Belt of the Companion +3 and the Bold Sword Knot of the Companion +3. These get me up to the Resistance Ignored cap when my Bondings proc. For my enchants I focus on stacking Crit to get extra damage. Bondings are essential on your companion to hit bigger numbers on your TW as well as just hitting for higher damage since the power share from your Aura Gifts will go to your companion who then returns them to you, essentially buffing yourself.

I also have these active companions:

*Air Archon – More Damage when an enemy is at less than full health, almost always active.

*Earth Archon – More Damage when you are at full health. Since you live in your Temp HP typically, this will almost always be active.

Tamed Velociraptor – Tested this on PC and saw that it increases temp HP recieved from TW, so I find this as a constant. It starts at 1% if its just you in your party with it, but increases by 1% for every person with it, meaning it could be 5% if everyone uses it.

Energon – Increases our Max HP by 5%. When you sit at high numbers this will be a pretty big buff.NOTE: I have noticed a bug with the Energon where if your HP changes, log in or change map you don’t receive the bonus 5% from the change. Making it idle and active again will fix this issue.

Siege Master – Extra 3% damage, 7% in Stronghold (At blue). This damage increase increases your returns from Templars Wrath. Its also just a really nice damage buff in general. I swapped my Earth Archon out for this since this helps my Temp HP and is active more often than Earth Archon due to my playstyle of diving into combat, resulting in, possibly, some big hits.

*Earth Archon and Air Archon are interchangable dependant on playstyle.

Stats:

NOTE: These screenshots are based off of pre-bondings change. So DO NOT expect to get the same results as these images.

Now, I know that a lot of Pallies run with high Recovery, however I don’t feel the need for it, I get my encounters back more than quickly enough, I get my daily back quickly enough and if I am running with a DC who has haste, I will often have permanent Shield of Faith up. If I ever feel like I am lacking in my recharge speed I can always tap my Divine Call to shorten my cooldowns by a third. It also grants a little amount of AP to get the daily back quicker.

Mounts:

I use the bonus from the Guard Drake for the extra 2000 Power, I am looking at switching to Black Ice Warhorse eventually though for the 4k Power and the T-Rex mount for the debuff combat power. I chose the bonuses I did for the following reasons:

Artificers Persuasion – A nice little in combat buff. Makes you quicker, gives recovery and AP gain so you can deal damage/protect more consitantly just for using your artifact, which you will be using quite often anyway. Also, the buff lasts 15 seconds everytime you use it, max your artifact and its able to be activated every minute.

Gladiators Guile – Movement speed buff for having more than 75% of your Stamina. Gets you into combat slightly quicker. Will be active most of the time. Would advise swapping this out for Calvalrys Warning if you have a mount combat power.

Protectors Camaraderie – 3% more Defense and Power when your companion attacks, stacks to 4 times. So basically 12% more Defense and Power. Doesnt sound like much but it adds up. Especially since our companion attacks often.

Shepherds Devotion – Using a daily buffs your teams Defense, Deflect and Movement by 5% of your power for 10 seconds. The higher power you get, the more useful this is, but since we pop dailies quite often, its a really nice addition for our groups survivability

Assassins Covenant – Since, as a Pally, we dont care for our Defense or Deflect, we are more than happy to drop this by 10% to gain more power. We do also lose some Life Steal but we dont really need Life Steal except for if its an emergency.

As for the different types of insignias. I am working towards filling up with Prosperity (For HP) and Dominance (For Power). However, you can use Skill (Crit/CA) if you need the extra crit.

Rotation:

I don’t really have a set rotation since I do what needs to be done at any point. However entering combat will always be the same. Trash and Bosses do have slightly different entry rotations but they work pretty much the same.

Trash

Radiant Strike, Binding Oath, Circle of Power, Templars Wrath, Valorous Strike, Divine Call, then Valorous Strike until your encounters are back, repeat. Dont use Binding Oath until the previous one is done, if you do, you will miss out on the damage at the end of it, which can be very powerful. Also, use Shield of Faith whenever your Daily is ready to be used. Also remember to use Radiant Strike if you ever get knocked away from the group.

OR

Radiant Strike, Templars Wrath, Sacred Weapon, Divine Call, Smite, Valorous x2, Sacred Weapon, Divine Call, Smite. Here you need to be able to manage your Divine Calls and your Radiance buffs more. This rotation is more for damaging things a lot more than the previous rotation. With this, you can hit some fairly good numbers with smite and Divine Judgement. Before using Divine Judgement I always go Radiant Strike, Sacred Weapon, Divine Call, Divine Judgement in an attempt to maximise the damage output coming from it, our terror and our Aura of Courage. This is also the rotation I use for dailies/weeklies etc.

Boss

If you need some help getting aggro use this:

Bane x1, Radiant Strike, Binding Oath, Templars Wrath, Bane x2, Valorous, Divine Call, Valorous until encounters return. Again, dont Binding Oath until the last one is done, use Shield of Faith whenever ready and Radiant Strike back in, in case you get knocked out. The rotation for this is made more difficult by the fact that bane isnt affected by Divine Call. However, with the recovery we have, the 3 stacks of bane on the boss should go when you have 3 seconds left until you are full again, which is enough time to place the first 2 and then it will be ready for a third. I always use my artifact if I know that a heavy hit is coming or I need a little more bulk whilst setting up or if I’m having to sit with the more squishier players since they need the extra Damage Resistance. If you are running with a second tank and you see they have aggro you can also run to the squishier players and place your artifact on them, if possible.

If you do not need more help getting aggro, use this:

Radiant Strike, Templars Wrath, Circle of Power, Bane x3, Valorous, Divine Call, Valorous until cooldowns are finished. Now because we arent using Binding Oath, it may seem like we have slightly less temp HP, but because of the damage increase from Circle of Power, we will actually have the same, if not more. Most of the comments on the previous rotation still apply here, the main reason for this rotation is to deal slightly more damage and be less likely to hurt yourself due to the lack of Binding Oath.

That’s it!

Thanks for reading this and learning about what I do. Hopefully this can help some of you players wanting to play a really nice tank build. I am always happy to hear feedback and will always be updating as and when something changes. Also if anyone has any other questions, feel free to leave them below or add me on Xbox @THE UK Unknown or PC on @dfielding#3331. Also if you need any help but arent getting a response on either of those, check the Neverwinter Paladins (Healadins and Tankadins) facebook page, I’m active on there if you need me.

Whilst there are many different races as an option for a Pally tank, I chose the human race, for the extra 3 Heroic Feat Points as well as the +2 to ANY ability score. More Constitution is our friend. The extra 3% Defence is also nice. However, there are also other possible races, which I will briefly go into:

Tiefling – My initial race. You get a bonus 5% damage when your target is under half HP (Basically a free Fire Archon) which helps you hold aggro and keep your HP up in boss battles. Also as a Tiefling, when you take damage, you have a 10% chance to drop the targets power by 5% for 5 seconds. A nice little debuff just for doing your job. You also get +2 to Charisma for more AP Gain and CA Damage. You also get a choice of +2 to Constitution or Intelligence. For this, choose Constitution since that’s a Pallies main stat.

Dragonborn – I find this race has a valid place for every class. +2 to any 2 stats of your choice isn’t something you can just pass up. Power and Crit being increased by 3% is a good self buff, it also increases the amount of power you share with your allies. The 5% more healing and abilities comes in handy, more heals from your healers in dungeons, your Life Steal and Sanctuary.

Metallic Ancestry Dragonborn – The most expensive class in the game, only obtainable from the Sigil of the Metallic Ancestry Dragonborn from either the Auction House or from Dragonforged Lockbox or Glorious Resurgence Lockbox. This is what I will be switching to when I get it. You get +2 to any 2 stats (The same as Dragonborn) and the same +3% bonus to Power and Crit as the Dragonborn. Where this race outshines any other is its third Trait. You recieve 3% more healing from all spells and abilities (a decrease from the 5% from Dragonborn but still useful) and your HP is increased by 3%. This increases the amount of power you can have and therefore share as well as improves survivability.

I rolled my Stats with my Constitution as max (18) and my Charisma and Wisdom equal at 13 . I invested in Constitution and Wisdom at any point I could to focus on getting my crit up, since I don’t care all that much about my recovery. This along with the +1s to all at levels 30 and 60 give a final Constitution of 25 (27 after the human +2) and Wisdom of 20.

My final Stat Rolls:

As you see, I have 32 Constitution, this I will come back to when we talk about gear.

Now is the bit which is rarely changed from one Pally to another, the Feats.

Heroic:

Divine Action – 3/5 – Any way to get more AP will help your team and yourself.

Weapon Mastery – 3/3 – Working to maximise crit and damage output. This will help.

Toughness – 3/3 – For a Pally tank, HP is everything. Can’t say no to an extra 9%.

Light’s Shield – 0/5 – Trying to minimise Damage Resistance to get our Oath up quicker, plus its easy to make up Damage Resistance in combat.

Exemplar’s Haste – 3/3 – Encounter Powers recharging 6% faster? Yes please. More uptime on your Encounters, the more you can keep yourself alive and the faster you can get your AP up.

Wrathful Strikes – 3/3 – 6% more damage with At-Wills. Since your At-Wills will be your main way of dealing damage, this will help. It also helps you hold aggro since more damage = more aggro.

Dominating Presence – 0/5 – My auras radius’ are more than fine at their default size so an increase isn’t really needed.

Impassioned Pleas – 0/3 – Divine Call energy isn’t hard to come by and I rarely have a time when I don’t have at least one charge on it so an increase in the energy is a waste.

Divine Attunement – 0/3 – receiving more healing from spells, if needed, can easily be sorted by your race selection.

Steadfast – 5/5 – Getting an extra 2.5% Max HP for each point of Constitution you have is not something you can say no to. It will help a lot.

Divine Wisdom – 0/3 – More healing for each point of Wisdom, again if more healing is needed, can be easily sorted by races.

Force of Will – 0/3 – 3/3 if Human – More Crit Chance for each point of Charisma. An additional 6%, outweighs that gained from Weapon Mastery

Justice:

The main path of a Protection Pally. This is the path to reduce yours and your allies cooldowns.

Swift Flash – 0/5 – When you get struck you gain movement speed for 4 seconds, not really needed since if you are tanking you are going to be sat in one place most of the time.

Bound By Light – 5/5 – Control Strength is increased by 10%. Helps for smaller mobs with Templars Wrath’s stun.

Flash of Light – 5/5 – You will use your encounters a lot, so having a 25% chance of reducing an allies cooldown by 10% just for us using one is a chance worth taking. Mixing this with another Feat will make this proc a lot.

Radiant Champion – 5/5 – One of my favourite feats. Having 2 allies near me gives us 25% more movement speed and 5% cooldown reduction. Reducing your allies cooldowns just by them being near you and making them move faster can help them get out any danger if their stamina is low.

Stem The Tide – 0/5 – “When no allies are within 30′ of you” This is probably one of the worst feats we have. Allies includes companion so if you aren’t near your companion or your team, where are you?

Echoes of Light – 5/5 – a 10% chance to make your next encounter immediately recharge all of your encounters is amazing. It can only happen once every 15 seconds but that’s more than enough. Mixing this with Flash of Light also helps your team out a lot.

Beacon of Hope – 2/5 – Dailies come often for us so the extra heals for your team will also. Not much since we’re only going for 100% of our weapon damage, but that can make up for around 2000 HP every 2 seconds which can help a bit.

Purifying Fire – 0/5 – The extra damage would be nice, however since we use a lot of encounters, we will often stop this feats effect, making it pretty much pointless.

Prism – 3/5 – As with Beacon of Hope, dailies come often, so the extra healing for our team helps. 12 seconds of healing allies what you are healed will help and have a pretty strong uptime.

Vengeful Judge – 1/1 – The Justice topper. Using your Divine Call increases your damage by 35% for 10 seconds (more threat) as well as reducing all your cooldowns by 35%. This makes your Divine Call act as a large amount of recovery, allowing you to put the recovery investments elsewhere.

Light:

Quick mention about Bulwark. I didn’t invest in it at all, I see more potential from Light and Justice over it. Anyway, this is Lights section, so this is where we put our last 15 Paragon Points. You only come here for the Aura Gifts.

Gifts of Light – 5/5 – You heal for 10% more. Well, it’s either this or your heals do more for 8 seconds after taking damage. This is the lesser of the two evils.

Seraphim – 0/5 – Not for a Protection at all. Plus its limited to 8 seconds wheras Gifts of Light is constant. Enough said.

Light Touched – 0/5 – Healing Spells generate more AP. We don’t use any healing spells so investing in this would be a waste of points.

Warrior’s Bastion – 5/5 – The main source of defense for us. Getting 10% more from equipment helps us survive some of the bigger hits.

Aura Gifts – 5/5 – The biggest buff any Pally can give.sharing 25% of your base power (Your standing + the 10% of your max HP bonus from the Protection Mechanic). Yes they have to stay within 30′ of you for 6 seconds to receive this buff but that will happen easily in dungeons.

The biggest bit! I will be splitting this into At-Wills, Encounters, Dailies and Auras. Each will include the ones I most commonly use and why.

At-Wills:

Radiant Strike – Easy access into combat and a 5% Damage and Arm Pen buff for 15 seconds. Also hits multiple enemies to get some damage off on them.

Valorous Strike – A 5% Damage Resistance buff for 15 seconds is nice but not needed.

Shielding Strike – Does a lot of damage. It provides a shield on the final hit of its combo, which is good. However I prefer the buffs from Valorous, so this one is personal bias. Works well for damage. I find it hits slightly slower than Valorous Strike but seems to do better damage, this will be slotted alongside Radiant Strike.

Oath Strike – The final hit of this attack forces the enemy to attack you for 3 seconds which helps a lot with maintaining your aggro. Can be a good alternative in melt groups for gaining threat easier, or just if you dont feel like you need the Damage Resistance buff.

Encounter:

Binding Oath – In dungeons, this is only ever used for heavy trash in end-game dungeons (FBI/MSVA/MSP) 5 seconds of enemies being forced to attack you, as well as giving you 100% of your max HP as a shield (Which can be a lot). Oh, did I forget to mention that when the 5 seconds is up or your shield has been drained by enemies it bounces back 100% of how much you took back at the enemies in a 30′ area? Yes you also take 50% of that damage but I’d say that’s worth it. So, the more max HP you have, the more damage you have potential to do. At max this shield lasts for 8 seconds instead of 5 seconds. This is why I say not to use much defense, the more defense you use, the more damage you mitigate, so the less this is going to go down and the less damage will be done with it.

Templars Wrath – Another one that never leaves my tray in dungeons. You hit enemies in a 30′ radius for damage, seem basic right? Well that is until you realise you gain 300% of the damage that you dealt as temp HP. Hitting hard with this can give you a lot of HP, especially if buffed right. You can combine this with Binding Oath to make the damage come from this shield and leaving your base HP untouched. Note: There was a thread about what does and doesn’t affect the Temp HP gotten from TW, link here.

Circle of Power – 30′ wide area to improve your damage by 30% as well as you and your allies damage resistance by 25% which lasts 10 seconds at base and 16 seconds at max isn’t really bad. However I stopped using this recently unless we are in a large group of trash mobs and I’m sat with the squishier members of the group (An example being the first wave of Svardborg or FBI Hill Climb)

Bane – The thing that I swapped Circle out for in my normal tray. A debuff of 10% damage and a buff for allies of 10% more damage. This is an all round solid buff. Especially when you realise it has 3 charges and can be stacked 3 times, meaning 30% more damage for your allies and 30% less damage for you and your allies for 10 seconds.

Vow of Enmity – This increases your own damage by 20% and any hit that an ally does to the marked target will result in more threat for you in case of any issue where you may struggle to get/hold aggro (AH So Cute from Adorable Pocket Pet for example).

Sacred Weapon – I use this in lower dungeons (Any T1s and T2s) alongside smite for some big hits. Use if you know you can survive without one of the others (probably Binding Oath since it has a similar effect minus the Temp HP) for the fact your next 3 attacks force the enemy to attack you as well as the additional damage. Quicker bosses and even easier threat.

Dailies:

Divine Judgement – A solid damage dealing daily with slight AoE damage. Always good to have at least one damaging daily. Very rarely leaves Tray.

Shield of Faith – Reduces damage taken by allies by 30% and lets them get 30% more healing for 6 seconds (12 seconds at max). Never leaves Tray unless soloing dungeons/PvP. Some people may argue that Divine Protector is better, yes, you redirect 60% of damage they would take to you and you take 60% less, however at max it lasts half as long and so you can have more of an uptime on Shield than Divine Protector.

Divine Protector – That being said, this can also be used if you are carrying through new 70s, in bosses that act randomly (Epic Cragmire Crypts) or you need to take damage for the Protection mechanic to proc. I would still prefer Shield over it.

Lay on Hands – An underrated power. This can be a lifesaver. Instant heals to max and removes all DoTs from them. Not to mention it only uses AP proportional to the HP that was healed, meaning this can be used often. Useful for if you want to solo dungeons or you are missing a healer and you are doing a dungeon with a lot of AoEs and the DPS lack the Life Steal to heal themselves.

Auras:

Aura of Courage – Extra damage for your allies, higher DPS, quicker runs. I have seen this hit for some good numbers. Never leaves my tray. Off-hand artifact power also gives 25% Control Resistance to you and your allies, more buffs.

Aura of Wisdom – Increased cooldowns, 10% at base and 25% at max. Lets you get your tanky powers and utility powers back in time. Also helps your team a lot more, reducing your dps encounters, your DCs encounters all increase the dps. Also the off-hand artifact power gives 1% total AP every 3 seconds to you and allies.

Aura of Protection – More Damage Resistance for you and your allies. 5% at base, 12.5% at max. Can be helpful, especially at lower item levels and levels. I find that it loses its use after a while, but can still help when running with another pally who is using one of the above.

Most of the boons are pretty easy to tell what you need. I always go for either HP, Power, Crit, anything that heals you when being hit, Resistances to Control/AoE etc. Below I will only say which I chose out of the pair/quad and why.

Sharandar:

Dark Fey Hunter – More power = more power share. Plus Pallys don’t really care for defense all that much.

Fey Precision – More chance to crit is always wanted for damage. Also deflect reduces the effectiveness of Binding Oaths damage.

Feywilds Fortitude – An extra 1600 HP. HP = Tanky. HP = Power = More Power Share. We don’t really need the 3% extra AP Gain since we can make up for that elsewhere.

Elven Tranquility – We will be getting hit a lot, if your base HP gets taken down, this can heal that up. I’d rather be able to heal my own damage and stay alive than dealing more damage.

Elvish Fury – Well, Stamina Regen is good, if you were to use your stamina, I don’t use mine all that much so find that kinda pointless. We don’t Deflect all that much so Fey Thistle isn’t that great for us. There comes a point where you don’t use potions so the bonus 10% from them means nothing. So the extra power for killing is nice for getting your Templars to deal more.

Dread Ring:

Reliquary Keeper’s Strength – Ignore the movement, since its nothing major. The extra 250 power isn’t all that much either but it’s still extra power share for your team.

Evoker’s Thirst – Regeneration only occurs outside of combat so, other than the slight increase to incoming healing, there’s no point. Life Steal helps you heal yourself a tiny bit and also goes towards Assassins Covenant.

Forbidden Piercing – Since we want our Binding Oath to deal as much as we can get it to, we want to avoid deflecting. The Resistance Ignored will also help in general with damage.

Enraged Regrowth – More healing when being hit. It also comes with an extra 4000 Defense, which I don’t like, but I’d rather have the heals over the extra damage.

Augmented Thayan Basion – A shield for 10,000 damage can be a big helps in sticky situations, also it works similar to Binding Oath where it will redirect damage to a nearby enemy. Rampaging Madness takes too long to get the affect since you need 50 stacks and can only get 1 stack a second, so you need to be fighting for at least 50 seconds just to get its effect for 10 seconds. Endless Consumption seems good at first, but we aren’t going to be Life Stealing often or much so it’d be wasted. Burning Guidance is another wasted one since we don’t use healing spells.

Icewind Dale:

Note: I havent completed these boons yet, I only have the first 3 but I will put what I will be choosing for the last 2.

Weathering The Storm – AoE Resist is always nice, the CA damage could also work here but it’s not an important stat to us.

Appreciation of Warmth – Incoming Healing Bonus can help the healers keep us alive if we get that low. Again Stamina Gain would be nice, if we used our stamina much.

Sleet Skills – Extra Crit Severity helps our powers deal more damage. Recovery is not a big thing in my build as you will see when we get to stats.

Cold Shoulder – Damage Reduction is a nice thing to have, helps you and allies survive some bigger hits. Cool Resolve wont do all that much since we wont be missing Stamina.

Avalanche – This last set of boons are honestly bad. Since we will be getting damaged often, we can easily get 20 stacks giving a free 15,000 damage.

Underdark:

Note: Missing the last boon here but again, will put what I will choose.

Primordial Might – Extra power and HP. Gives more Power and a little more Tankiness. All this power shares with allies. Again the defense will reduce the effectiveness of our Binding Oath.

Primordial Focus – Extra Crit and HP. Extra damage and sharable power. The Life Steal can be passed on as it can be made up elsewhere.

Drow Ambush Tactics – Extra Combat Advantage Damage can help at time and I see it more useful than Regeneration.

Drawven Footing – Control Effects have a shorter time when applied to us, makes tanking a lot easier. The stamina gain bonus again isn’t helpful since we rarely use stamina.

Abyssal Strikes – Extra Damage is always nice. The chance for Demon Slayer isn’t that great so I find it useless, the only demons we really face are in Demogorgon and you wont be hurt all that much during it so the damage decrease isn’t worth it. The extra 25% Control Bonus is a nice amount but you wont really need it.

Tyranny of Dragons:

Note: Not progressed nearly at all on this campaign as I only have the first 2 boons, again, will list my choice for the others.

Dragonheart – Extra HP is always wanted, need I say more?

Dragon’s Gaze – Crit Strike is good for more damage. Deflect decreases effectiveness of Binding Oath so I avoid.

Draconic Armorbreaker – Extra Armour Pen is going to be helpfull and is more useful to us than Defense would be.

Dragon’s Thirst – 3/3 – Extra Life Steal for Assassins Covenant. Incoming Healing isn’t really needed for us. The Crit Sev would be nice, however I feel the extra power from Assassins Covenant would be better overall. The increased Control Strength isn’t really needed all too much since we can hold aggro more than easily.

Guild Boons:

I am in a guild hall 20 so we have most of our boons maxed. I will put the level next to the boon to make sure.

Power – Level 10 – Extra 8000 Power to power share and use myself. The Armour Pen is good to use until you get yourself to 60% Armour Pen without it using Bondings.

Hit Points – Level 10 – Extra 36000 max HP. Gives us more HP to Power conversion for our Mechanic to then Power Share. Also more tanking capabilities.

Maze Engine

Abyssal Regeneration – Extra healing from DCs/Healadins etc as well as extra from my self heals like Life Steal. More diverse than the Life Steal Severity boon to me.

Demonic Resilence – Reduce the times that Control effects have on you to make your job as a tank a little easier.

Demonic Swiftness – Gaining AP quicker is always a good thing, plus we don’t use stamina so regenerating it quicker does nothing for us.

Baphomet’s Might – Displace Fate isn’t really worth it because of how situational it is, Engine Inspiration is useless since we don’t use healing spells. Baleful Clutch could be good but I don’t have issues with holding aggro. The extra Crit gained from Baphomet’s Might helps out quite a bit in combat.

Elemental Evil

Wave of Force – HP and Power for the same reasons as above

Heart of Stone – Life Steal Severity is more useful in combat than Regeneration is

Searing Aggression – More crit, more damage. Recovery isnt needed all that much with this build so its easily skippable.

Gale of Retribution – Heals after being hit topped off with a nice buff to Crit. Better for me than Wall of Wind since I don’t care for recovery, Bolstering Storm gives unneeded stamina gain and Furious Whirlwind gives extra Lifesteal Severity which although good, isn’t quite needed as much.

Storm Kings Thunder

Frosty Demeanor – More Control Resist is good. If Cold Hearted gave more Life Steal instead of Life Steal Severity I would have chosen that for the buff from Assassins Covenant.

Survival Instincts – Like said before, we don’t use Stamina, so Stamina Regen isn’t useful for us. The extra incoming heals is, however.

Icy Wrath – Stamina Missing? Well, we don’t. A chance to gain an extra 2000 damage on your next hit is nice since we will always be getting hit.

Glacial Strength – HP is our main focus, never say no to it.

Chill of Winter – A little extra damage is always nice. The other ones just aren’t for our class. We don’t heal, we don’t use potions and we don’t deflect all that much.

Healing Warmth – Due to the amount of heals that we will be doing now we are using Prism and Beacon, I am testing to see how this does with damage compared to Chill of Winter since it has more of a chance to proc.

The Cloaked Ascendancy

Aura of Hope – The extra AP gain is better than just stunning, gets yours and your allies dailies back quicker.

Abberant Power – Getting hit lets you deal more damage, so just keep up tanking.

Jungles of Chult

Tyrant’s Terror – You gain 500/750/1000 Power and 800/1200/1600 Maximum Hit Points. – 3/3 – This boon is the only one to go for if you are wanting to maximise your power share, like I do. After mechanic, it gives us 116 power (not including increase to HP from feats)

Soul Syphon – Chance on Hit to gain a stack of Soul Syphon. On killing a creature, you release all stacks of Soul Syphon in a burst at all nearby enemies. Each enemy recieves 2000 damage per second lasting 1 second per stack of Soul Syphon. You restore 1% of your max health for every stack released. Stacks up to 10 times. – Okay, so a basic hit an enemy, get a stack. Kill an enemy, lose all stacks for effect boon. This is nice to use since it can cause 20000 damage to enemies over 10 seconds and give you 10% of your HP back. That’s if you can get all 10 stacks however.

Head – Jarls Gaze – 5,877 HP is, admittedly, not a large amount of HP. However, its worth it for the extra power to improve your power share. It also gives you even more power if in an Everfrost Zone dependant on how high your Everfrost Resistance is. I am aiming for the Guise of the Wolfclan however since it is better overall. A good alternative until you can get one of these is Dragons Loyalists Visage due to the HP that it gives alongside a nice amount of power.

Chest – Deepknights Brigadine – 50495 HP. Easily the best Chest for a Pally. Reinforced with Major Hit Points Armor Kit for the Extra 800 HP.

Arms – Pilgrim Restoration Tahadus – HP/Power/Rec/Def – Cant go wrong with these, good piece of gear and fairly easily accessable from the Trade Bar Merchant. Will be upgrading to Primal Restoration Ibhendis when I get to ToNG just for the overall increase in stats over these.

Boots – Vivified Oathkeepers Restoration Poleyns – Everfrost Resist/HP/Power/Crit/Def – Gives a good amount of power and HP. Thats all the reasoning I have for these. Will be swapping these out for Primal Restoration Isikhumbas when I start running ToNG as they give more power.

NOTE: I will be changing the HP reinforcement kits to Power reinforcement kits over time for the extra power share.

Neck – Cloak of the Protector. Not the best of cloaks, but would rather use this over switching out another artifact for the Greater Protector set. Reinforced with Major AP Gain Jewel for +100 AP Gain.

1 Ring of the Hunter +4 Power/Crit/Movement – Good solid ring for more power, also Off/Def enchant slots.

Waist – Greater Plated Belt of Constitution – +4 to your Constitution at max. Since Constitution is the main stat we want to focus in, this is essential. Also a part of the Greater Protector set. Reinforced with Major AP Gain Jewel for +100 AP Gain.

Pants – Drowcraft Chausses – HP, Recovery, Defense. Gives the set bonus for the Drowcraft (Heals allies when you crit for a little bit) plus have some good supporting stats. Reinforced with Greater Everfrost Resist Armor Kit for 5% Everfrost Resistance.

Weapons – Relic Set. We want to maximise our damage too to get and hold that aggro. This set also gives us a slight defense boost instead of an offensive one if you ever have one of those urgent situations. Main Hand Artifact equip power to boost Radiant Strike, more damage on entry to combat, no complaints. Off-Hand Artifact equip power to give Control Resist with my Aura of Courage, good team buff.

Enchants – You want to maximise your HP and your Power, so put Radiants in your Offense and Defense slots, whilst putting Darks in your Utilities for the extra movement speed to get you in combat faster.

Armor Enchantment – I current run a Lesser Soulforged so if I do mess up something I can get back and get aggro back without issue. Currently in process of swapping to an Elven Battle Enchantment so I can reduce controls and stuns on me, making tanking more seemless.

Weapon Enchantment – Currently run a Greater Terror for the debuff, looking to work towards a Feytouched as its power increases the Temp HP gotten from Templars Wrath.

You will want to run a Debuffer as your main one to help the team out. I currently run with a Sellsword as my summoned, a Rebel Mercenary will also work since it is basically a reskinned version of the Sellsword. I run an offensively built companion, stacking its Armor Pen and Crit mainly to get myself up the respective caps. I use Bold Neck of the Companion +3, Bold Belt of the Companion +3 and the Bold Sword Knot of the Companion +3. These get me up to the Resistance Ignored cap when my Bondings proc. For my enchants I focus on stacking Crit to get extra damage. Bondings are essential on your companion to hit bigger numbers on your TW as well as just hitting for higher damage since the power share from your Aura Gifts will go to your companion who then returns them to you, essentially buffing yourself.

I also have these active companions:

*Air Archon – More Damage when an enemy is at less than full health, almost always active.

*Earth Archon – More Damage when you are at full health. Since you live in your Temp HP typically, this will almost always be active.

Tamed Velociraptor – Tested this on PC and saw that it increases temp HP recieved from TW, so I find this as a constant. It starts at 1% if its just you in your party with it, but increases by 1% for every person with it, meaning it could be 5% if everyone uses it.

Energon – Increases our Max HP by 5%. When you sit at high numbers this will be a pretty big buff.NOTE: I have noticed a bug with the Energon where if your HP changes, log in or change map you don’t receive the bonus 5% from the change. Making it idle and active again will fix this issue.

Siege Master – Extra 3% damage, 7% in Stronghold (At blue). This damage increase increases your returns from Templars Wrath. Its also just a really nice damage buff in general. I swapped my Earth Archon out for this since this helps my Temp HP and is active more often than Earth Archon due to my playstyle of diving into combat, resulting in, possibly, some big hits.

*Earth Archon and Air Archon are interchangable dependant on playstyle.

NOTE: These screenshots are based off of pre-bondings change. So DO NOT expect to get the same results as these images.

Now, I know that a lot of Pallies run with high Recovery, however I don’t feel the need for it, I get my encounters back more than quickly enough, I get my daily back quickly enough and if I am running with a DC who has haste, I will often have permanent Shield of Faith up. If I ever feel like I am lacking in my recharge speed I can always tap my Divine Call to shorten my cooldowns by a third. It also grants a little amount of AP to get the daily back quicker.

I use the bonus from the Guard Drake for the extra 2000 Power, I am looking at switching to Black Ice Warhorse eventually though for the 4k Power and the T-Rex mount for the debuff combat power. I chose the bonuses I did for the following reasons:

Artificers Persuasion – A nice little in combat buff. Makes you quicker, gives recovery and AP gain so you can deal damage/protect more consitantly just for using your artifact, which you will be using quite often anyway. Also, the buff lasts 15 seconds everytime you use it, max your artifact and its able to be activated every minute.

Gladiators Guile – Movement speed buff for having more than 75% of your Stamina. Gets you into combat slightly quicker. Will be active most of the time. Would advise swapping this out for Calvalrys Warning if you have a mount combat power.

Protectors Camaraderie – 3% more Defense and Power when your companion attacks, stacks to 4 times. So basically 12% more Defense and Power. Doesnt sound like much but it adds up. Especially since our companion attacks often.

Shepherds Devotion – Using a daily buffs your teams Defense, Deflect and Movement by 5% of your power for 10 seconds. The higher power you get, the more useful this is, but since we pop dailies quite often, its a really nice addition for our groups survivability

Assassins Covenant – Since, as a Pally, we dont care for our Defense or Deflect, we are more than happy to drop this by 10% to gain more power. We do also lose some Life Steal but we dont really need Life Steal except for if its an emergency.

As for the different types of insignias. I am working towards filling up with Prosperity (For HP) and Dominance (For Power). However, you can use Skill (Crit/CA) if you need the extra crit.

I don’t really have a set rotation since I do what needs to be done at any point. However entering combat will always be the same. Trash and Bosses do have slightly different entry rotations but they work pretty much the same.

Trash

Radiant Strike, Binding Oath, Circle of Power, Templars Wrath, Valorous Strike, Divine Call, then Valorous Strike until your encounters are back, repeat. Dont use Binding Oath until the previous one is done, if you do, you will miss out on the damage at the end of it, which can be very powerful. Also, use Shield of Faith whenever your Daily is ready to be used. Also remember to use Radiant Strike if you ever get knocked away from the group.

OR

Radiant Strike, Templars Wrath, Sacred Weapon, Divine Call, Smite, Valorous x2, Sacred Weapon, Divine Call, Smite. Here you need to be able to manage your Divine Calls and your Radiance buffs more. This rotation is more for damaging things a lot more than the previous rotation. With this, you can hit some fairly good numbers with smite and Divine Judgement. Before using Divine Judgement I always go Radiant Strike, Sacred Weapon, Divine Call, Divine Judgement in an attempt to maximise the damage output coming from it, our terror and our Aura of Courage. This is also the rotation I use for dailies/weeklies etc.

Boss

If you need some help getting aggro use this:

Bane x1, Radiant Strike, Binding Oath, Templars Wrath, Bane x2, Valorous, Divine Call, Valorous until encounters return. Again, dont Binding Oath until the last one is done, use Shield of Faith whenever ready and Radiant Strike back in, in case you get knocked out. The rotation for this is made more difficult by the fact that bane isnt affected by Divine Call. However, with the recovery we have, the 3 stacks of bane on the boss should go when you have 3 seconds left until you are full again, which is enough time to place the first 2 and then it will be ready for a third. I always use my artifact if I know that a heavy hit is coming or I need a little more bulk whilst setting up or if I’m having to sit with the more squishier players since they need the extra Damage Resistance. If you are running with a second tank and you see they have aggro you can also run to the squishier players and place your artifact on them, if possible.

If you do not need more help getting aggro, use this:

Radiant Strike, Templars Wrath, Circle of Power, Bane x3, Valorous, Divine Call, Valorous until cooldowns are finished. Now because we arent using Binding Oath, it may seem like we have slightly less temp HP, but because of the damage increase from Circle of Power, we will actually have the same, if not more. Most of the comments on the previous rotation still apply here, the main reason for this rotation is to deal slightly more damage and be less likely to hurt yourself due to the lack of Binding Oath.

Thanks for reading this and learning about what I do. Hopefully this can help some of you players wanting to play a really nice tank build. I am always happy to hear feedback and will always be updating as and when something changes. Also if anyone has any other questions, feel free to leave them below or add me on Xbox @THE UK Unknown. Also if you need any help but arent getting a response on either of those, check the Neverwinter Paladins (Healadins and Tankadins) facebook page, I’m active on there if you need me.

A Guide to Wizardry PvE Control Wizard Guide – Mod 14 Here’s the link to the complete guide in Google Docs: http://bit.ly/GuideToWizardry Last updates: 16.07.2018 – updated mod 14 gear including Orcus set due to recent fix, updated Smolder section about stacking For all lazy people, below is video with quick look at the feats […]

UPDATED on August 16th 2018! What was added to this guide for Mod 14 and what also was update on the latest update of the guide on August 16th 2018? :- I added a variation with a picture that’s important of another loadout – Basically, it’s my same build in another loadout form without […]

Honestly, I have no issue with FBI except for the hill, if there are a few giants throwing rocks at me whilst they have the drummer buff. Other than that I’m fine. With how slow the bosses hit, it isnt all too hard to get TW going before the hit. Hati is the only one who can be a pain to get it against begore the first hit.

its a good build quick question tho. why purifying fire I have not tested it but when you use Templars wrath I have heard it negates it. builds basically the same except I use 2 in prism 3 in beacon of hope to assist in healing. also they proc burning guidance so I still do dmg while helping the team.

Thanks! Yeah, using a damaging encounter on the enemy afflicted with Purifying Fire will stop the fire. I used it back when I used to only use things like TW, BO, Circle. For that it worked well since most of my damage and attacks were at-wills, since changing to use SW/Smite I’m seeing its effectiveness less and less. I am considering respeccing to include the prism/beacons

I aim to keep my build as up to date as possible. Whenever I respec, I always update my build within a day. I last updated about a week ago (still need to update some images right now from yesterday) to include the new feats and boons that I changed to

Out of all the River District weapon sets, the Fey is the best one for a Pally for the extra AP. Lifeforge isnt worth it for 2 reasons. 1) We dont have enough defence for it to make any difference 2) The power that we do get from the set isnt classed as base power and therefore isnt shared with our team.

I am personally sticking with my Sellsword, as of right now I see no need to change. The earliest I will consider changing this is Mod 12b when the Bondings changes come but it is more than likely I will not be changing, even then.

Hi, sorry for the long delay, I took a break from everything neverwinter for a bit. I assume you mean the Stalwart Golden Lion? It can be helpful just for helping you tank, however its active bonus kind of sucks in all honesty. You can always replace the siege with any archon if you dont have it yet, since they fixed the issue where they dont increase each other, even having one green would help your personal damage

I actually did consider running with OBC for a bit when I first started, but I’d rather run with companions that increase my damage and just stack crit on my companion since theres not that many stats that I find worth stacking on my companion. Plus I dont feel I’d get all that much from running the OBC since it would only activate on my TW, which I dont use primarily for damage, and Smite, which the increase would be nice but dedicating a companion slot around the damage from one encounter doesnt seem worth it. Thats just my opinion though, obviously if you use it and it works well, I’d be happy to find out what your numbers are.

This isnt a dps build at all, I can rival people over 1.5k il below me, but by all means it is not dps. This is a tank build and can tank anything in the current game. On top of this, I know how a Pally works and I have taught several people one-on-one how to be a Pally and that has improved their capabilities massively. I would also appreciate not coming onto my build and promoting other builds, thank you. Also, looking at how quickly you posted on mine after posting on another build, I’d say you hadnt read the build…

Sorry to say but your pally is a dps build, i play a buff/tank pally and my def is standing at least 17k and power at 32k can litteraly tank anything without no trouble but it seems a nifty build though.

This really isnt. Yes it has some DPS, but nothing comparable to that of a DPS build. Its a Buff Tank build. However as an OP going for maximum power share, you will have a large amount of DPS since you can get yourself to around 120k power fairly easily. Its a side-effect but it does not make the build a dps build.

Not at all, I get about 1.5-2 mill TempHP from Templars Wrath, so I just use that and renew it as and when it comes up, I only really use Divine Judgement as my daily unless my team need the extra help of Shield of Faith, then I’ll use that. So, except that, my dailies arent used for myself

I only use Templars Wrath first in order to make sure my base HP doesnt go down, I then use Circle for the extra damage for the following attacks and DR, then divine call to bring my cooldowns back up so that I can pop another Templars Wrath for higher TempHP before the initial one has depleated.

The Control Bonus, honestly I read it somewhere when I was making my build initially and it felt right in game as such. However, I could be wrong as I can no longer find that thread, it was a reddit one too so not exactly a reliable source. May update this after some research.

The Tyranny of Dragons boon is “Grants 3/4/5% increased Life Steal”, so to me that seems like it would increase the base stat since it doesnt specify chance or severity and I only noticed chance go up when I got it, didnt check to see what percentage by though, again this is something I will check out when I finally get the next boon in that campaign.

Hi, I did post my boons for Maze Engine. Either way, these are what I chose:

Abyssal Regeneration – Extra healing from DCs/Healadins etc as well as extra from my self heals like Life Steal. More diverse than the Life Steal Severity boon to me.

Demonic Resilence – Reduce the times that Control effects have on you to make your job as a tank a little easier.

Demonic Swiftness – Gaining AP quicker is always a good thing, plus we don’t use stamina so regenerating it quicker does nothing for us.

Baphomet’s Might – Displace Fate isn’t really worth it because of how situational it is, Engine Inspiration is useless since we don’t use healing spells. Baleful Clutch could be good but I don’t have issues with holding aggro. The extra Crit gained from Baphomet’s Might helps out quite a bit in combat.

thanks man. i have to say i just started the pally just yesterday, thanks to the double X.P. event that’s going on its helped me get to a steady area with my my pally and i have to say that even now with just the feats and powers its helped a ton. So, again… thank you

I noticed you said that you run your Sigil as you Active Artifact but in your picture you had WoE in your active slot and the Sigil in a secondary. I just want to clarify which would be the best to have in the active slot?

Thats a mistake I made whilst rushing through updating this that I overlooked in checking, updating that now. But I would advise running Sigil as your active until you are more than confident in your tanking capabilities in any dungeon. Once you feel comfortable with that, swap to WoE to help yourself and your team out more than what the Sigil would.

Hey there. Great build. Very similar to mine. But I have some questions/points I would like to Talk about:
Powers. I normal use reletless avenger to get fast to Mobs and knock away in tong. Burning Light because it simply Does a Ton of damage and blinds and TW because It’s aoe and give the temp HP.
RA, TW and smite on Boss.
I Run a Small crit build with an obc because I want to stack as much Power as possible for obc and 2 mount imsignias which buffs me and Party for % of my Power.
Im normaly the Top paingiver and only some gwf with abtut 2k IL above me can Top me.
This is why I consider obc to be the better way to a dmg/buff OP that going for crit. Is it even harder now to stack enough crit AND armpen AND Power in mod 12b?

Hey, I personally dont like Relentless Avenger, but thats just me, also since I never have an issue getting from group to group quickly, I never need it for the extra speed. As for burning light, I dont like the charge time that it has, yes I know it can be cancelled but if I’m going to be using a power, I’m going to want to use it at the strongest point that I can. OBC is recieving another nerf in Mod 12b with an internal cooldown being added (1 second if I remember right), not to mention it only procs once off of things like burning light, so for damage, crit builds are the way to go. However, I dont aim for big damage with my build, the damage is just a nice addition, I dont aim to top any paingiver charts. As of it being harder to stack everything, since you only need to stack power on yourself, that hasnt changed, as for Crit and ArmPen, thats not changed too substancially. Its still more than possible to get both to cap from your companion.

I went for damage because I realiezed fast that I can Tank everyrhing early with this good Tank build amd was looking for further improvment on my OP. My conclusion was I need more buffs and want to do more dmg for Group Support and Solo content so I went allout Power with OCB. IT works pretty good for me and I probably wont swich to crit because it simply lower my group effectivnes. Btw on my Personal tests it seems that obc icd is more like 0,5 sec. It’s there but I hardly notice any change from mod 12. I think I will do some more tests with other encounters but on my opinion this Kind of OP is a tanking, dealing damage and sometimes even healing monster. I go even further and say 5 protection OP with similar builds can do anything in the game arm. Probably even tong.
So from me: Great build! Keep going and switch to PC so We could Player together 😉

All I know is that with some patch notes they changed one of the powers (I assume the active bonus since thats all it has) to 1 second, I dont use it and dont want to spend that much to test it. Thanks for all the feedback though, once my controller decides to start working properly, I’m going to look at maybe adding more damage. Also, I do play on PC but I dont play an OP since I dont want to have the same on both since that’s kind of boring :/

Sort of. I dont really run those powers personally, but it does let you do more with them if you are full hp. I go full hp and low defense/deflect in order to get my mechanic up quickly (10% of your hp as power) so that my Aura Gifts buff is higher for as long as it can be.
But yeah, you got it basically, so I actually take more instead of mitigating

Sorry, I honestly thought I put the weapon names in. They are Oathkeeper’s Mace for Main Hand and Oathkeeper’s Shield for Off-Hand. Weapon Enchant is Greater Terror, Radiants in all slots. Off-Hand has Aura of Wisdom Artifact Power and Action Point Gain Artifact Stat Increasem. My Main Hand has the Radiant Strike Artifact Power.

I am sorry to say man, but I do more DPS and Crit on a CON – CHA Build as a OathBound Paladin Protector, the feats used in your build do not help with increased Crit and even a few more points on Wisdom is not making the difference, as your boon choices are what helps. But even with an increase to your critical Strike if you are not using the right encounters you might as well kiss that Crit goodbye and your build is not using the right encounters to take advantage of the Crit Strike in fact its going backwards.

“Purifying Fire – 0/5 – The extra damage would be nice, however since we use a lot of encounters, we will often stop this feats effect, making it pretty much pointless.”

We use a lot of encounters? You mean that you don’t even hit any mob with your at wills 5 times at least? This is all this feat takes to make it worth it. After any mob has 5 stacks of purifying fire, you need to use an encounter power to rinse and start dealing damage again anyway.

I wasn’t sure you were quite aware of the mechanics of purifying fire feat, so I wanted to throw the question at you.

Yeah, looking back at it, I did a bad job explaining this…Okay so most of the time I will have used an encounter before I used an at will 5 times. So I dont feel like I get the max efficiency from the feat. I did use it initially until about 13.5k ish when I realised I was cancelling it out more than I should be if I want to use it well.